Kind of a funny meeting today. About sobriety, of course, but the subjects were the Tenth Step and problems during the Christmas holiday.
Good assessment and descriptions of just how the Tenth Step works into our daily lives. I certainly heard a lot of things I needed to hear. And I gave an awful demonstration on how it doesn’t work, when it came my turn and I let my big mouth take over. People laughed, but I knew the minute I let my irritation take over that I was wrong. And that’s in the Tenth Step, when we are wrong…But it did make me aware of the fact that it always needs to be in our everyday in sobriety. I certainly got a chance to practice that.
But it was the other subject that got a lot of our groups attention. Many described their struggles during this period of time. Not during our drinking years, but right now. I certainly could identify with many. Not just getting ready, but the for what? My family, for instance, is scattered all over the map and not a chance to be with them. That was true of a number of others today.
There were other problems discussed, I’m sure everyone has their own. However, after this was all over, later on tonight I had a chance to sit down and go over the positive of all of this. The spiritual side, although some of that was discussed. However it did bring back that the solution to all my problems is spiritual. My Higher Power in my life. I know that from my own experiences over the years.
What is it that I thought about? Hope. Doesn’t matter that I’m not really thinking about something I want or not. It’s just the hope that whatever it is that the God of my understanding presents to me, I will be able to accept. That’s my hope. And, as I have learned over time, it is hope which leads to faith.
Besides most of my thoughts these past couple of days have not been much on other problems, as they have been on the spiritual program in my life today. How often I can find myself agreeing with what Bill W. once said about what he wrote in the Eleventh Step in the 12&12. Years after he had written it, he went back and reread it. Afterward he said that in reading that that he felt like a beginner. How often I get that same feeling.
These thoughts I had today are all about the basics of this program for me. It once again reminds me that it may be true that I’m not responsible for my getting sober. But I am responsible for my staying sober. So, once again I have to take a deep breath and just focus for a few moments on what it is that I have to do to stay on this path I set out on in the beginning. It’s all there in the literature and these 12 Steps.
One more thing. Just before I came up and sat down to think about these things, I had a moment where I knew absolutely how grateful I am for all my Higher Power has done for me. I needed to say thanks.